Kamloops City Hall Can Meet the Challenge of the BC Carbon Tax...

That is the feeling I came way with today after Public Works Director, David Duckworth, gave a presentation on preliminary research he has done on the carbon tax and the City of Kamloops.

• A good starting estimate on how much city operation emit is 7700 metric tons of carbon dioxide a year. This is broken down into 50% buildings, 32% fleet (vehicles), 15% utilities, and 3% street lights.
• If we do nothing about reducing our emissions, the carbon tax impact will be $41,500 in 2008, rising to $244,000 in 2012.
• But we are not going to do nothing. Considerations include building retrofits (eg, solar panels on the Canada Games pool), heating and power systems in city work vehicles that will reduce idling, requiring  that virtually all civic buildings are built to a high energy efficiency (LEED) standard, and piloting new more energy efficient streetlighting technology.

Some other interesting tidbits: because the city is part of a large buying group, price for gas for city vehicles is about 20 cents less than the pump; city has had a program that has replaced 400 watt streetlights with 250 watt, and 250 watt with 100 watt. Still as bright, but much more energy efficient.

The rising pass of oil helps the business case for the green technologies. And, so will the carbon tax.

Comments

[Dylan]

While the street lighting upgrades and the attempts to meter water are definitely needed from an electricity conservation perspective, they actually do very little to offset carbon given our province's predominant reliance on hydro-electricity which is supposedly clean (though studies have suggested that decomposing materials in reservoirs can create methane emissions that can ultimately compare with some coal plants). The City is faced with the somewhat mutually exclusive goals of reducing energy costs (which will come from electrical upgrades) or reducing GHG emissions. What will you do?!

[Quimby]

Will these initiatives cost more then the carbon tax?

Who is funding them? The province?

[Mickael Maddison]

That's encouraging. From my standpoint supplementing buildings with solar power is a great way to cut down on carbon emissions. Sure we have hydro power here in BC, but many places south of us do not. The less energy we use, more can be sold to areas that do burn coal etc. to feed their energy needs. Besides our energy use is only increasing. The more we offset now by using solar and changing to lower energy solutions the better.

Even if the short-term cost of these initiatives is significantly higher than the taxes that we'd pay by doing nothing, I believe it's better for everyone if we just get it done. A carbon tax may not be the ideal way to clean up the environment, but at least it's an indicator of where we stand and how we can do better.

I hope the city will get behind this and set a great example for other communities.

[Quimby]

Setting examples or reducing our carbon emissions is a laudable move, but to equate the moves as being to save dollars on the Carbon Tax. This just goes to prove the redundancy of the tax.

The fact that any level of government, business or an individual would spend ten times the cost of the tax on reducing their GHG emissions is ridiculous. The return of $30/year in income tax for the average Joe, doesn't make up for it or help reduce it. If a city or regional district decides to go green because of issues of leadership or out of a sense of duty that is great, but no business will ever commit to such endeavors for a loss. Nor could most individuals afford to do it.

Arjun, do you support the Carbon Tax(s)?

[Mickael Maddison]

Quimby -- you wouldn't happen to have gone to the alternative energy fair at MacArthur Island awhile back?

There were a lot of technologies available to reduce our grid or fuel-type energy consumption and the prices are becoming more and more reachable.

There were talks about how the cost recovery time is shrinking. As the demand increases, more options are being created and more players are entering the market.

Sure, the carbon tax is annoying, unfair, unbalanced, even unreasonable, but the point is as soon as we start paying for something we don't want to, we start looking for ways around it.
I'd much rather invest my "tax" dollars into long term return items like solar cells.

Even if the city never manages to profit in the short term, I find it hard to believe that there will not be significant long-term benefits; both financially and environmentally.

Businesses are looking for ways to go green. Individuals are looking for ways to go green. We have to clean up our act at some point...

[Arjun Singh]

I do support the carbon tax Quimby, because I think it will help spur us on to more sustainable ways of living. Overall it is revenue neutral, which is not say that some will feel more pain than others. But it's something we need to do.

[Quimby]

Unfortunately, carbon taxes have been ineffective in every jurisdiction that uses them. The provincial budget even calls for increases in emissions. The CCPA just came out with carbon footprint data divided into each income decile. The top 10% had a footprint over 2.5 times of those in the bottom decile. This tax, and LPC "Green Shift" will disproportionately hurt the lower to middle income earners in BC and Canada. This policy is less about green shift then it is about a tax shift to consumption. Which is a neo-liberal/Friedman dream for decades. Those that afford to pollute will continue to pollute. Those that can't afford, and produce very little in proportion, will be squeezed even further. The only thing this tax will do is exasperate the homeless situation in BC and Kamloops.

Arjun as usual, your intentions are good but your actions are lacking.

[Quimby]

As for revenue neutral, we'll see after the cuts in education and health due to paying this tax. We'll see after food,rent, property taxes,bus fares and cabs increase.

Revenue neutral for the government, doesn't mean revenue neutral for the public. The extra costs to every industry will passed on and the resulting inflation will be devastating.